m in such cases stand these
Lesdiguieres, these King's Lieutenants; not instruments of justice, but
walls erected for the shelter of Privilege and Abuse whenever it exceeds
its grotesquely excessive rights.

"Do you wonder that they will not yield an inch; that they will resist
the election of a Third Estate with the voting power to sweep all these
privileges away, to compel the Privileged to submit themselves to a just
equality in the eyes of the law with the meanest of the canaille they
trample underfoot, to provide that the moneys necessary to save this
state from the bankruptcy into which they have all but plunged it shall
be raised by taxation to be borne by themselves in the same proportion
as by others?

"Sooner than yield to so much they prefer to resist even the royal
command."

A phrase occurred to him used yesterday by Vilmorin, a phrase to which
he had refused to attach importance when uttered then. He used it now.
"In doing this they are striking at the very foundations of the throne.
These fools do not perceive that if that throne falls over, it is they
who stand nearest to it who will be crushed."

A terrific roar acclaimed that statement. Tense and quivering with the
excitement that was flowing through him, and from him out into that
great audience, he stood a moment smiling ironically. Then he waved
them into silence, and saw by their ready obedience how completely he
possessed them. For in the voice with which he spoke each now recognized
the voice of himself, giving at last expression to the thoughts that for
months and years had been inarticulately stirring in each simple mind.

Presently he resumed, speaking more quietly, that ironic smile about the
corner of his mouth growing more marked:

"In taking my leave of M. de Lesdiguieres I gave him warning out of a
page of natural history. I told him that when the wolves, roaming singly
through the jungle, were weary of being hunted by the tiger, they banded
themselves into packs, and went a-hunting the tiger in their turn. M. de
Lesdiguieres contemptuously answered that he did not understand me. But
your wits are better than his. You understand me, I think? Don't you?"

Again a great roar, mingled now with some approving laughter, was his
answer. He had wrought them up to a pitch of dangerous passion, and they
were ripe for any violence to which he urged them. If he had failed with
the windmill, at least he was now master of the wind.

"To the P